9-5-09 PNC Park

I hadn’t been to a game since last Thursday, a span of 9 days had passed since I snagged my last baseball.

After missing Friday’s game, I was back in action today. 

Batting practice was just beginning when I entered at 4:30, so there were no Easter Eggs to be found.  However, there was a ball laying on the warning track near the bullpen. 

As I started to set up my glove trick, a Pirates batter lofted a fly ball at my section.  My glove was off of my hand.  I dropped my glove to the ground.  I realized the ball would fall short, so I hopped over a bleacher to get into a better position.  The ball bounced on the warning track, hit the fence separating the bleachers from the bullpen, and caromed right to me.  I caught the ball with my bare hands on the bounce.  It was ball #1.

I then turned my attention back to the ball on the warning track.  I had lost my rubber band when I was running into the bleachers (it fell off of my glove) and was working with a replacement rubber band that I didn’t have a feel for.  Every rubber band is different and needs adjusted appropriately.  After two readjustments, I reeled up the ball.  However, as I was bringing it in, the glove hit to wall and the ball fell out.  Great.  Now the ball was partially under neath some padding and I would have to work more to get the ball.  As I was making my second attempt, I was surrounded by groundskeepers.

I ended up finally getting the ball in the right spot so I could reel it in.  It was ball #2.  The groundskeepers thought the trick was really cool and asked a few questions about how it was done.

I got ball #3 tossed to me by Matt Capps.   

STATISTICS:
Game:  6 balls (3 hit, 2 thrown, 1 device)
Season:  343 balls (181 hit, 101 thrown, 61 device)
Games: 70 games (7 of which didn’t have BP)
Average:  4.90 balls per game
Career:  509 balls
Streak:  85 consecutive games attended with at least 1 ball snagged.
Attendance:  27,071